I run Suse 10 X86_64 on a laptop. Last night I was trying to get my ATI TV Wonder USB2.0 to work. In the process, I installed a couple of drivers. In particular, I installed one package in YAST, and it took an unusually long time to install. I remember thinking that the wait was odd.

I shut down my system this morning, and when I tried to reboot, it wouldn't boot. It only gets through a couple of lines (up to initrd /boot/initrd) and quits. I get a little bit more output when I try to boot into failsafe mode, but not substantially more.

At first I thought the problem was related to my trying to configure the video capture device. So, I booted to a livecd and manually tried to remove any reference to the bttv driver. That didn't seem to have any effect.

I then looked at /boot/initrd and noticed that (a) it was modified around the time that YAST mysteriously hung for so long, and (b) it was pointing to a file with SUPER in its title. The same was true for vmlinuz.

That seemed odd for three reasons: (1) the files were modified at the time of interest, (2) the last thing I see before my system freezes is a reference to /boot/initrd, and (3) I don't recall ever seeing SUPER in the titles before.

I then took a look at /lib/modules and found these directories:

2.6.13-15-default (I remember seeing this one in the past)
2.6.13-15.ck6.SUPER.1-default (I've never seen this one before)

The name of my initrd file is similar to the second directory name. In addition, both of these directories were modified near or at the time YAST caused my system to hang for so long. These points make me suspect that the second directory has something to do with my problems.

I'm in way over my head here. I have full control of the filesystem by booting to a livecd, so I can change various options. But I have no idea what to change and would prefer not randomly to change boot-related options, as that might frustrate the situation.

I suspect that I perhaps accidentally upgraded my kernel, and the new kernel has some problem with my hardware.

Does this theory sound likely, given the facts above? I'd appreciate any alternate explanations, and especially any suggestions of how to fix the problem.

The more I look into this, the more certain I am that my theory is correct. The old kernel directory (2.6.13-15-default) is basically empty, except for a couple of modules that I manually added.

The "SUPER" directory is full. My kernel appears to be this: http://www.opensuse.org/SUPER. I don't even know what that is, other than what I read on the site. I certainly don't know how it got on my system.

Is there an easy way, through a livecd, do download and replace an entire kernel (manually)? I'm guessing the answer is no...


Barring that option, I suppose I could copy out my data and start over. I could also try to stick with the SUPER kernel and diagnose the problem...

Cross your fingers, lad. It *might* be easier that than. If you have a live cd to boot, do so. Then mount the partition which contains /boot. Cd into that partition and directory. Take a carefull look at the contents. Are the original vmlinuz and initrd still there?

If so, cd to grub, and look at menu.lst (probably have to be root). Has your menu.lst been changed? If so, edit it to point to the original vmlinuz and initrd if they are still there. Then try a reboot.

Check the original /lib/modules: are the modules still there? If not, the best you can hope for is to boot into command-line mode. Then mount the installation cds, and start reinstalling kernel and /lib/modules rpms. Then edit /boot/grub/menu.lst if the original SuSE entry has been changed.

Thanks for the suggestion. Unfortunately, everything is gone...

Maybe I should download the source and try compiling a kerel. What a mess.

Actually SuSE provides kernels for you easily. The only big issue is getting the right version.

In YAST, search for kernel, you will see kernel 2.6.13.15 and source, if they are checked now, click them till you get the update symbol, if they are not, check them, YAST can install the kernel and the kernel source for you, far easier than worrying about compiling it yourself.

If you want to update kernels, you can actually do that straight through YAST too, just download the new RPMs from here: http://search.belnet.be/packages/sus...d/x86_64/HEAD/ and install them. The only I find here is they are Kernel of the Days, which is not great, I am still looking for a nice repository of the full releases( 2.6.14, 2.6.14.1, 2.6.14.2, etc) but as yet have been unsuccessful.

EDIT: I should mentiont hat with YAST doin the kernel install it takes care of EVERYTHING for you, including bootsplashes, GRUB, initrd... very handy if you are only interested in fresh kernels, or the limited ones available.(Like me)

That's a great idea. The problem, of course, is that I can't boot into my system, so I can't access YaST. I think I can manage packages through the installation system, however. That would allow me to boot to the installation system's kernel but manage the kernel that is installed on my filesystem. I'll try that tonight. If it doens't work, I'll start over with a clean install.

In any case you should be able to boot into a liveCD such as Knoppix.

If ... ... you have one.

Yep, I have several--knoppix, elivecd, and another random one. I can boot into them and access the filesystem. In theory, I could boot into a livecd, download kernel sources, and compile a new kernel. But I lack the knowledge and time!

Problem solved. I booted into the installation system and loaded my original kernel from the CD. Note to self: Be *very* careful using YaST.